1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a connector to be suitably used for a power harness used in eco-friendly cars such as hybrid cars and electric cars especially to transmit a large amount of power, and a wire harness.
2. Description of the Related Art
A power harness is used for connecting between devices such as between a motor and an inverter or between an inverter and a battery in, e.g., a hybrid car or an electric car, which has made significant progress in recent years, for transmitting a large amount of power, and a connector in a two-divided structure composed of, e.g., a first connector portion provided with a first terminal(s) as well as a first terminal housing for housing the first terminal(s) and a second connector portion provided with a second terminal(s) connected to the first terminal(s) as well as a second terminal housing for housing the second terminal(s) is provided to one end of the power harness.
In recent years, all components in such eco-friendly cars have been lightened in weight in order to improve energy saving performance, and size reduction is desired as one of effective means of reducing weight.
The present applicant has proposed a laminated-type connector having a laminated structure in which, when a first terminal housing is fitted to a second terminal housing, plural first connecting terminals and plural second connecting terminals are alternately arranged so that surfaces of the first connecting terminals respectively face surfaces of the second connecting terminals to form pairs and plural contact points formed therebetween are sandwiched between the insulating members (Japanese patent No. 4, 905, 608).
In the connector of Japanese patent No. 4, 905, 608, a connecting member is provided to press an insulating member adjacent thereto to collectively fix and electrically connect the plural first connecting terminals to the plural second connecting terminals at each contact point, and an insulating member assembly is formed by connecting the plural insulating members to each other and restricts the insulating members from moving in a fitting direction and a width direction which is perpendicular to a lamination direction of the laminated structure and to the fitting direction.
Such a configuration realizes a small laminated-type connector by eliminating a retaining jig for holding the insulating members and also allows positional misalignment of the insulating members to be reduced even in the case that an excessive force is applied to a cable.
In the meantime, in a connector used for transmitting a large amount of power as described above, since spark may be generated by arc discharge if the fitting of the two terminal housings is released while an electric current is still flowing, which is dangerous for work and may damage terminals, etc.
Thus, a device to detect the fitting of two terminals and to interrupt an electric current when releasing the fitting of the two terminals (High Voltage Interlock Loop (HVIL) etc.) is sometimes provided.
Japanese patent No. 3,820,355 proposes a device configured that two terminal housings are fitted and a first fitting detection terminal provided on one of the terminal housings subsequently slides and comes into contact with a second fitting detection terminal provided on another terminal housing so that a power circuit is connected when the two fitting detection terminals are in a contact state and the power circuit is interrupted when the two fitting detection terminals are in a non-contact state.